Horse urine, breathalyzers, media wars and ALL CAPS liberal bashing

March 31, 2011

Today we have some great content on wbez.org to round out March. Seriously, I have over 10 blogs publishing today. All top notch (except this one, of course). Take a look around if you have time. May I suggest "Top 5 dinosaur myths from Clever Apes, Top 5 above-average bars from Dolinsky and the jailhouse skyscraper from Lee Bey.

(Looks like I'm filling up with ultimate! Photo by Rotating Frame/Flickr)

Top story: I forgot this from last week, but did you see the story of Mayor-elect Rahm Emanuel's favorite choice for police chief botching eight Philadelphia breathalyzers? Apparently an officer (a lone officer, according to Charles Ramsey) was responsible for not properly calibrating eight breathalyzer machines and it was giving bad numbers. Therefore, the Philly police may have to throw out 1,100 drunk driving charges. So if you are a drunk driver in Chicago, Ramsey might be your guy.

C story: Alderman Brendan Reilly is on a hot streak! First, he succeeded in finishing off the Children's Museum's idea to move to Grant Park. Then, he stepped up to the plate to put into law that horse urine be deodorized on the spot where it falls. I remember Alderman Natarus (former 42nd Ward alderman) making a stink about horses and urine/diapers back in his heyday and the Chicago media (including me) laughing him off the City Council floor. But somehow, Reilly is serving his constituents on this very, very serious manner. Hey, you have to hand it to Reilly. His first two campaign points that won him the election were 1) Keep out kids, and 2) No more horse piss. I remember the campaign signs.

D story: I don't want to be insensitive and this is mainly directed at the media: But how many times can it be the end of Cabrini Green? I swear we've covered every building that has been knocked down with that emphasis.

E story: Funny little point - yesterday, an NPR newscaster stumbled on the phrase "Tea Party-backed candidate..." She stumbled on the word "party" & "backed" and irate listeners, callers and e-mailers thought she wanted to say "tea baggers" because according to their rants, she is a lefty, pinko, communist, elite, liberal, biased NPR scumbag. I'm paraphrasing, of course. The calls to our newsroom (it was a national newsreader, not us, but thanks for listening) reminded me of this gem of a comment, left on a post I did last week about Berny Stone:

"I'm here to tell you that you ,Justin Kaufmann, aren't fit to discuss Berny Stone. You're a LEFT-WING PUNK blogging for a soon to be DEFUNDED Cesspool,NPR"

May I respond?

What's with conservative commenters and using proper names. I ran into this last time I ticked off this crowd. They must have been taught an SEO class on "how to drag one's name through the internet mud." Was that class offered at the Discovery Center, right after "How to use ALL-CAPS effectively."

LEFT-WING PUNK? I may be a punk, but left-wing is a bit much. I don't consider myself left or right wing, but the goal is to be in the center. I mean, who would want to be out on a wing? You don't hear of a core or heart or soul being in a person's arm or shoulder.

Finally - last I checked, Berny Stone was a liberal Democrat from Chicago. If I am a left-wing punk as you say, how would I not be fit to discuss Berny Stone? It took one sentence for you to contradict yourself. Awesome.

Okay, so you've been served. Thanks for reading, though!

Weather: Oh no, it's now supposed to rain and perhaps snow tomorrow for the Cubs' opener.

Sports: The Bulls bounced back with a huge rout last night to protect their #1 seed status in the Eastern Conference. In other news, Bruce Weber says there is no truth to rumors about him taking Oklahoma head coach job. Darn.

Kicker: Now that @MayorEmanuel is taking a breather, may we turn our attention to our real mayor, White Sox Manager Ozzie Guillen. Comics and impressionists are working hard, including this gem on Vimeo where fake-Ozzie hosts a book club: